Fait Divers: Annotating the Antiquated

“When William F. Buckley Jr. revived American conservatism by founding National Review in 1955, he said the magazine’s job was to stand “athwart history, yelling stop.” At that time, history did seem to be moving in the wrong direction if you were a conservative, and Buckley was gutsy to admit as much. Later, during the Reagan era and after, conservatives enjoyed thinking that history was on their side. They saw themselves as riding it like a bronco, yelling not stop but faster! faster!”

The National Review was founded by a pathetic closet queen named Marvin Liebman who, a few years prior to his death, seeing just how destructive his movement had become to the same-sex oriented, finally decided to come out.

When the AIDS epidemic was raging his friend William F. Buckley declared that the HIV+ should be tattooed to indicate their serostatus.

Liebman said nothing.

And did nothing

“faster! faster!” my gay ass.

“That’s not how they look now. On no issue is history moving faster than on “gay rights”–an already antiquated term for full and equal participation and acceptance of gay men and women in American life.”

There is noting “antiquated” about the gay rights movement. It persists in many forms which despite the indifference of bottom-feeders like Kinsley.

“So we are taking off our masks, are we, and keeping
our mouths shut? as if we’d been pierced by a glance!” wrote the great Frank O’Hara in that long ago day.

And where was Kinsley during “antiquity”?

Don’t Ask — Don’t Ask!

“The work is not finished, of course, but what took black Americans more than a century, gays have accomplished in two or three decades (thanks in no small part to blacks, who designed the template for this kind of social revolution).”

In no small part thanks to gay African-Americans like Bayard Rustin and James Baldwin of whom Kinsley says nothing.

” We still argue about it, but the whole spectrum of debate has moved left. A right-wing thug like Tom DeLay or Newt Gingrich probably has more advanced views about homosexuals than dainty liberals of the past century like Adlai Stevenson or Hubert Humphrey. And whatever the actual views, public expressions of overt homophobia are now unacceptable from any national politician.”

“Covert” is “in”

“The debate of 14 years ago about gays in the military seems almost quaint. Kids grow up today with gay friends, gay parents, gay parents of friends and gay friends of parents.”

Damned Kids!

” If only blacks and whites were as thoroughly mixed together in society as gays and straights are. Kids are also exposed constantly to an entertainment culture in which gays are not merely accepted but in some ways dominant. You rarely see a reality show without a gay cast member, while Rosie O’Donnell is a coveted free agent and Ellen DeGeneres is America’s sweetheart.”

Yadda, yadda, yadda.

I much prefer these two —

“The notion that gays must be segregated out of the military for the sake of our national security must strike Americans younger than, say, 40 as simply weird, just as we of the previous generation find the rules of racial segregation weird. (O.K., run that by me again: they needed separate drinking fountains because … why?)”

You want weird?

“For 14 years the GOP has stood still as history has gone charging past. In last week’s CNN-sponsored debate, every Republican presidential candidate said he supports “Don’t ask, don’t tell,” the arch compromise of 1993. This ridiculous policy allows servicemen and -women to be gay in some existential sense but tosses them out if they talk about it or do anything about it.”

Existentialism is Just So Gay!

“Most congressional Republicans voted for “Don’t ask, don’t tell,” but the party platform for the 1996 presidential election retreated from it: “We oppose Bill Clinton’s assault on the culture and traditions of the armed forces, especially his attempt to lift the ban on homosexuals in the military. We affirm that homosexuality is incompatible with military service.” This last formulation, repeated in the GOP platforms of 2000 and 2004, is especially head in the sand. They can “affirm” anything they want, but homosexuality is obviously not incompatible with military service. There have always been gays in the military. The question is what conditions they serve under.”

An Officer and a Homosexual. Yeah, right. Coming to a theater near you.

“This used to be an issue that Republicans employed to torture Democrats. No longer. While Democrats hardly build their campaigns around it, in the CNN debates last week every Democrat was happy to go on record as favoring lifting the ban once and for all.”

” By contrast, every Republican cowered behind “Don’t ask, don’t tell,” patently wishing the whole thing would go away. Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney agreed that now “is not the time” to reopen the issue. Mike Huckabee blathered nonsensically about the “uniform code of military conduct.” John McCain was almost campy, practically bursting into song about our “most wonderful military.” Not one of them attempted to defend the ban on its merits. But not one would oppose it.”

“And yet not one, I suspect, has any doubt about where this issue is going. When opponents of gay rights talk ominously about a “gay agenda,” they are not completely wrong. There has been an agenda in the sense of a long-term strategy, not unlike the carefully plotted strategy of Thurgood Marshall and others in the civil rights movement that ended formal racial segregation. It was a brilliant decision to start with the military rather than attempt to outlaw discrimination generally or push right away for gay marriage. Twenty years from now, maybe sooner, gays will have it all.”

When supercilious creeps like you are dead?

FABULOUS!

“On bigger issues too, today’s Republicans find themselves on the wrong side of history. On the advice of my fellow TIME columnist Bill Kristol, Republicans killed any health-care reform 13 years ago with the slogan “There is no crisis.” No candidate of either party is saying that now. In fact, the crisis has gotten worse and will be harder to solve than it was in 1994.”

“Of course, you shouldn’t change your principles just to be on the right side of history. Standing athwart history and yelling stop can be noble, and sometimes even works. But that’s not what today’s Republicans seem to be doing. They are chasing after history from a few yards behind.”

Take it away, Rufus!

“Thought that maybe we’d fall in love over the phone
Thought that maybe I’d really love being alone
Everybody but Heaven knows how I was wrong

Oh Lord, what have I done to myself?
What have I done to myself?

In this vicious world
Such a vicious world
There isn’t anything you can do
In this vicious world

Soaking on the ice, makin’ eyes all by myself
Didn’t realize you were so top of the shelf
Just you want and see when you turn, turn 23

Oh Lord, what have I done to myself?
What have I done to myself?

In this vicious world
Such a vicious world
There isn’t anything you can do
In this vicious world
Such a vicious world
There isn’t anything you can do
In this vicious world
There isn’t anything you can do
In this vicious world”

2 Comments

david-
was thinking of you this morning listening to npr’s weekend edition………..former pain-in-the-ass former republican congressman bob barr….major blockage to all things good when in the congress….saying gays should be able to serve openly in the military……i was in the kitchen, i actually stopped what i was doing and just stood there……..he went into great detail of why………floored me, really. the last person i ever thought would come out for gay/lesbian rights……..right there on my radio, wish i had a tape of it.

wow, then read your post today…….and i couldn’t but think, in many ways, things have advanced in a great direction. i know, there is a lot still to circumvent and change, but BOB BARR? saying not only ok for gays to be in military, but how people serving with them don’t have a problem???????????????????

the universe has shifted……please listen to the interview, it will give you a julep buzz to the positive. and from reading you sometimes you need a positive boost that things are changing…….

went to the trouble to register with your website today just to tell you this, so follow up on it, darnit.

Barr’s an exceptionally curious character. A VERY High Yellow, he was a major player in Impeachment-O-Rama, but appears to have turned in quite a different direction since. I’m told he’s registered as a “Libertarian” these days.